This is a thread for people to share their love of Metroidvanias, from old classics like Symphonia of the Night to newly announced ones like Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night and everything in between. Talk about your favorite metroidvanias, recommend others to people new and old to the genre and just discuss how much you love the genre.

What is a metroidvania?

A metroidvania is a combination of the gameplay style of Metroid's exploration and mechanics with the gothic style of the castlevania series, add in a few RPG elements and you have a Metroidvania!

An idea started by industry legend, Koji "IGA" Igarashi, the first metroidvania Castlevania: Symphony of the Night became a huge cult classic and earned a following that would expand the genre in many ways. From combo points featured in games like An Elysian Tail to rogue-like qualities like Rogue Legacy the genre has become a very popular trend in both handheld and indie crowds.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metroidvania

Symphony of Night is my favorite cause I love the music in some of the areas like the Chapel and Lost Painting from some of the rooms in the Inverted Castle. Also some of the 3D Metroivanias where good like:

Castlevania: Lament of Innocents and Curse of Darkness where pretty good too.

I never really got into the 3Dvanias, really disliked them.

Oh I love these games, I don't remember their names offhand there was one in the GBA and another in the DS where you collected souls for abilities. Those are the first ones that I played and really loved them.

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night wasn't the first, nor was it an idea started by Koji Igarashi. There's Super Metroid from 1994 and Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap from 1989 just to mention a few. Heck, Symphony of the Night starts the same way as Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap too, by playing the end of the last game.

Another interesting thing is that Koji Igarashi wasn't aware of the term "metroidvania" until somewhat recently.

I loved Symphony of the Night. I'm currently playing the first Lords of Shadows and so far it's been pretty cool. It reminds me of God of War. Though I'm playing the game the ending was spoiled for me, cause I accidently looked at the trailer for Lords of Shadow 2. This was before I purchased LOS 1. Even though I know Gabriel's fate in LOS 1, it still hasn't deterred me.